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Affiliated The BRITISH COLUMBIA HiSTORiCAL NEWS

Features A Guardian of the Boundary by Alec McEwen 5 First Fire Insurance Plan of Vancouver by John Spittle 8 Hudson’s Bay Company Lands and Colonial Surveyors on Vancouver island, 1842-1858 by James Patrick Regan 11 Roger Peachey, M. C., the Last Commissioner of the British Columbia Provincial Police Force by R.G. Patterson 17 A 1912 New Westminster Sampler by jacqueline Gresko 19 Ladies in Scarlet: An Historical Overview of Prostitution in Victoria, British Columbia 1870-1939 by C.L. Hansen-Brett 21

News and Notes British Columbia Historical Federation Annual Conference 23 Leonard Frank Display 30

Bookshelf Captured Heritage: The Scramble for Northwest Coast Artifacts by Douglas Cole; review by Richard Mackie 31 The Iron Church 1860-1 985 by Stuart Underhill; review by Jacqueline Gresko 32 Heads of Household in British Columbia ed. by Pat Vibert; review by Irene Moorhouse 33 Rolling with the Times by Wallace Baikie; review by Lorna Holyer 34

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The B.C. Historical Federation gratefully acknowledges the financial assistance of the British Columbia Heritage Trust. LE1TERS TO THE EDITOR GOOD BYE Could any members provide me with the follow ing copies of the B.C. Historical News: Vol. 1 No. 1 (Nov. 1967) Vol. 1 No. 2 (Feb. 1968) Unfortunately, all good things must come to an Vol. 4 No. 3 (Apr. 1971) end. I have enjoyed immensely my thirty-two Vol. 7 No. 2 (Feb. 1974) months as Editor of the B.C. Historical News Vol. 13 No. 2 (Feb. 1980) because of the unfailing support received from Vol. 15 No. 1 (Nov. 1981) members of the Council of the B.C. Historical Thank you. Federation, and from subscribers to the News. T.D. Sale I am especially indebted to Past Presidents 262 Juniper St. Barbara Stannard and Ruth Barnett for giving me Nanaimo, B.C. V9S 1X4 a unique opportunity to work and learn, and tc Patricia Roy for her important contribution as Book Editor and proof readerpar excellence. The staff at Dynagraphics, Victoria, deserve a special thanks for their patience and efficiency in typesetting, photography and printing. The next issue of the News will have a Deadline for Next Jssue Vancouver Centennial theme, and will be March 1, 1986 produced by guest editor Esther Birney. This The next issue of the B.C. Historical News will should be an issue to treasure. have a Vancouver Centennial theme. Please Best wishes to you all. submit articles to guest editor Esther Birney, 1240 —Marie Elliott Shorepine Walk, Vancouver, V6H 3T8.

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Page 4 British Columbia Historical News Alec Mc[wen

A Guardian of the Boundary

Rising prominently from a cliff top at Tsawwassen Beach, Point Roberts, about twenty miles south of Vancouver, a massive stone obelisk marks the place where the Canada/United States land boundary strikes the coast. Officially known as Monument No. 1 on the 49th Parallel,1 it is by far the largest of the more than 8,000 pillars and other physical objects that define the border between the two countries. The section of the boundary from the Rocky Mountains through the straits of Georgia and Juan de Fuca into the Pacific Ocean was estab 1846.2 lished by the Oregon Treaty of But the task The Boundary Obelisk at Point Roberts of identifying the actual line on the ground did not begin until more than a decade later when two separate boundary commissions were created: one to determine the position of the In April 1861 Hawkins reported that he had water boundary and the other to mark the 49th reached agreement with his colleague Camp parallel over land. bell, and also with Richards of the water Three water boundary commissioners were boundary commission, that a stone obelisk appointed in 1857: Archibald Campbell for the should be built at the western terminus of the United States, and two naval captains, James 49th parallel on Point Roberts, since this was the Charles Prevost and George Henry Richards, common starting point for the land and the who represented Britain. Because of disputed water boundaries. In his view: claims of ownership to San Juan and neighbour while a larger mark can give no greater ing islands, the commissioners were unable to significance to the spot on which it stands come to a decision? The location of the boun unless there were a special agreement to that dary was eventually settled by bilateral agree effect, as the coast of Point Roberts ... is ment in 1873, following arbitration by Emperor undoubtedly the most prominent point, it is William I of Germany.5 quite consistent that the most prominent Between the years 1858-62, a second commis beacon should be placed upon it... sion undertook the surveying, mapping and Accordingly, Hawkins informed Lord Russell, marking of the 49th parallel. Archibald Campbell the British foreign secretary, in October of his was again chosen as United States Commissioner intention to erect the obelisk, 2Ofeet high, which and his British counterpart was Lt.-Col. John he regarded as being “of comparatively small Summerfield Hawkins of the Royal Engineers. size for the purpose intended, having been so The commissioners and their staff located the designed solely on the ground of economy.8 The parallel of latitude on the ground by taking estimated cost was £1500, “a sum probably astronomical observations, and the boundary representing from twice to three and four times was then marked at intervals of a mile or more by that for which it might be performed in most iron posts or stone cairns.6 other parts of the world.”

British Columbia Historical News Page 5

6 Page British Columbia Historical News

the eastern section of the noma a 49th lies. 24 parallel survey,

offer

of appointment as British geodetic, commissioner coordinates, on and effect of the gravity

was later knighted. 17 Hawkins, the declined who initial adoption of astronomic, rather than

appointed hydrographer to the from and navy British inevitable discrepancies by the caused

Richards, who also became an was admiral, tions of nineteenth century technology, also and

subsequently retired the rank careless with of survey It work. admiral.16 results limita from the

the San Juan water boundary question positional and difference is not attributable to

Mountains. 15 Prevost as continued parallel an on adviser latitude of that it to is intended mark. The

Rocky the boundary to Woods Lake of from the regardless of its departure from the geographical

parallel surveyed 49th of the the remainder monument itself represents the actual boundary,

States member of the commission that 1872-76 of moved southward to proper its position. the But

careers. Campbell was the appointed United monument is incorrectly placed be it should

rated on obelisk the to on enjoy went illustrious to occasional complaints that because the

four All men whose names This commemo are apparent loss of Canadian territory rise gives

“monumental

egotism”. 14 theoretical parallel of degrees 49 north

latitude.23

tion, has been perhaps as aptly characterized ment actually lies about 800 feet the north of

the Canada/United States demarca boundary centre of the obelisk, even though the monu

practice, uncommon but not unprecedented on that the true boundary line passes the through

their own names were perpetuated on This It is it. formally accepted by both governments 22

concerned, the commissioners sure made that a now permanent treaty organization. 21

boundary, nor does identify it countries the to two a new International Boundary Commission,

ment say does not a

specifically Canada/United it marks that States boundary passed in

190820

interesting is to note that obelisk the although monu at Point Roberts. T9 care The entire the of

importance or necessity preservation.” 13 he It to its particularly urged the maintenance of the

as long as any political significance attaches such large cost of time, labour and and money”,

though obelisk small endure doubt I will not

marks that the

commissioners down at “laid had ...

suggested “substantial to London that the recommended the preservation boundary of the

Hawkins, possibly with in cheek, tongue In his final report to London 1869, Hawkins in

June 15th, 1846 knighthood. 18

West face Washington of Treaty was promoted to general and a received also

U.S. Commssr.

South face Campbell Archibald

Erected 1861

Long. 123°3’53”

East face Lat. 49°0’ 0”

Commssrs. H.B.Ms.

J.S. R.E. Hawkins, Lt.-Col.

Richards, Capt. G.H. R.N.

J.C. North face Capt. R.N. Prevost,

inscriptions, cut in granite: large the letters in

feet three in following width. the It bears

square a and about averages tapered that shaft

above the feet ground, nine base about with a

monument feet The 19 itself just stands over

shared by equally governments. 12 both

$7,590.38, was estimate, close to very Hawkin’s

specially-built of cost The tramway. 11 wooden

a to hauled the by top high, 160 of feet the cliff,

by Point and Roberts then gunboat British

material was to transported of the shore western

one to from two-and-a-quarter This each. tons

the was monument by blocks weighing formed

cut a granite, tons, 40 with about weight total of

E. solid Made New of Brown of Westminster. 10

A to to awarded build contract was the obelisk On the British Columbia side Monument No. 1 Notes stands on a municipal lane that adjoins the rear 1. International Boundary Commission, (a) joint report property, while its upon the survey and demarcation of the boundary limit of private residential between the United States and Canada from the Cull Washington portion is also on public land. The of Georgia to the north westernmost point of Lake of obelisk does not belong to any private owner, the Woods, Washington, D.C., 1937, pp. 205, 272. (b nor to any provincial, state or municipal author Official Maps, Sheet No. 1, 1913. ity. It is jointly owned by Canada and the United 2. Treaty of Washington, june 15, 1846, Treaties and by the International agreements affecting Canada, in force between His States, as represented Majesty and the United States of America, with Boundary Commission which alone is respon subsidiary documents, 1814-1925, King’s Printer, sible for maintaining the structure. In 1960, for Ottawa, 1927, pp. 28-29. example, field employees of the commission 3. This dispute and its eventual settlement are discussed cleaned the granite surface by sandblasting,25fully in James 0. McCabe, The San Juan Water was given a further facelift in Boundary Question, University of Toronto Press, 1964. and the monument 4. Protocol of Agreement, Washington, March 10, 1873, 1976 when it was sprayed using a high-pressure Treaties and agreements, op. cit., p. 50. water jet technique.26 5. Award of the Emperor of Germany, October 21,1872, The obelisk, like all other monuments that Treaties and agreements, op cit., p. 49. mark or define the international boundary, 6. [Otto Klotz (ed.)], Certain correspondence of the against wilful damage Foreign Office and of the Hudson’s Bay Company receives some protection copied from original documents, London 1898, or disturbance under a provision of the Interna Government Printing Bureau, Ottawa, 1899, contain tional Boundary Commission Act, enacted in i ng Foreign Office correspondence, International 1960, which imposes a fine of $500 and/or Boundary, 49th Parallel, British Columbia, Part Ill 1858- imprisonment for six months upon any person 1864, Part IV 1869-1870. The Commission’s final report injury.27 dated May 7, 1869 is given in Part IV, pp. 6-14. Neither convicted of causing such the British nor the United States governments had In 1961 the Province of British Columbia and published an official report of the Commission’s work the State of Washington jointly celebrated the and the information was considered lost until its centenary of the completion of the western chance discovery in London in 1898; see 0. Klotz, portion of the 49th parallel boundary survey. “The History of the forty-ninth parallel survey west of the Rocky Mountains”, The Geographical Review, vol. This event, organized by the Provincial Archivist 1917, 384-385. Society, 3, no. 5, May pp. and the Washington State Historical 7. Ibid., Part Ill, p. 58. took place at Point Rcberts on July 30. It included 8. Ibid., p. 65. a meeting addressed by prominent speakers 9. Ibid. from both countries, an exchange of flags, 10. Kathleen Weeks, “Monuments mark this boundary”, Geographical Journal, vol. 31, no. 3, symphonic band music and a barbecue. Because Canadian September 1945, p. 132. of the historical importance and imposing 11. Certain correspondence, op. cit., Part III, p. 65. presence of the granite obelisk, it was consid 12. Marcus Baker, Survey of the northwestern boundary ered most fitting to hold the festivities in the of the United States, 1857-1861, Geological Survey vicinity of the monument itself.28 BuHetin No. 174, Washington, D.C., 1900, p. 19, the pride taken by local 13. Certain correspondence, op. cit., Part III, p. 72. A further indication of 14. John W. Davis, “The unguarded boundary”, The residents in the care and upkeep of their Geographical Review, vol. 12, no. 4, October 1922, p. boundary monument appeared in a recent issue 600. of a Point Roberts newspaper. Lamenting the 15. Biography: Appleton’s Cyclopaedia of American growth of weeds and vines that had sprung up Biography, New York, 1901, vol.7, p.47; G.W. Cullum, turned it into “profana Biographical Register of the officers and graduates of around the obelisk and the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, N.Y., 3rd edn, tion of history”, the editor called for volunteers Cambridge, 1891, vol. 1, pp. 610-611. to form a combined Canadian-United States 16. Biography: Gerald Prevost, Admiral James Charles team to clear away the unwanted vegetation.29 Prevost in British Columbia, unpublished private Today, 124 years after it was built, Monument circulation, Vancouver, 1977; F. Boase, Modern Canada from the United English Biography, London, 1965; vol. 2, col. 1633; No. 1 not only separates W.R. O’Byrne, A Naval Biographical Dictionary, reminder of the States, it serves also as a proud London, 1849, p. 925. attainment of territorial growth and stability 17. Biography: IS. Dawson, Memoirs of Hydrography, through peaceful agreement between the two Henry W. Keay, Eastbourne, 1885, Part II, pp. 134-155; neighbours. It is part of the heritage of both Boase, op. cit., vol. 3, cols. 138-139. Biography: The Royal Engineers Journal, March 1, nations, an artifact to be admired and preserved 18. 1895, pp. 56-58; Boase, op. cit., vol. 5, coTs. 609-610. as a guardian of the boundary. 19. Certain correspondence. op. cit., Part IV. p. 6.

British Columbia Historical News Page 7 20. Treaty of Washington, February 24, 1925, Treaties and agreements, op. cit., pp. 299-310. 21. Treaty of Washington, February 24,1925, Treaties and agreements, op. cit., pp. 51 5-519. 22. Treaty of Washington, April 11, 1908, Article VII. 23. The present official latitude of the monument is 49°00’08”.027. This value will change as a result of a forthcoming readjustment of the North American Datum. 24. A.C. McEwen, “The Boundaries of Canada”, Terra vue, Autumn 1982, p. 33. 25. International Boundary Commission, Annual Report for 1960, p. 41. Don’t let your subscription expire. 26. International Boundary Commission, Annual Report Check your address label for date of renewal. for 1976, pp. 54-55. 27. Revised Statutes of Canada, 1970, chapter 1-19, section 8. 28. Harriet Seely, “Boundary Centennial Celebration”, Pacific Northwest Quarterly, vol. 53, no. 1, January 1962, p. 33. 29. The All Point Bulletin, August 1985, p. 4. Alec McEwen is a member of the lnternationa Boundary Commission.

John Spittle

First Fire Insurance Plan of Vancouver

To commemorate the one hundredth anniver were the Chas. E. Goad Company in Canada and sary of incorporation of the city of Vancouver, the the D.A. Sanborn Map and Publishing Company Map Society of British Columbia and the Cana in the United States. Sanborn surveyed a number dian Northern Shield Insurance Company have of Canadian cities before selling out his Canadian collaborated in publishing a facsimile of the city’s stock to Goad. first fire plan from an original print in Special The first Fire Insurance Plans of British Colum Collections, University of British Columbia bia towns—Granville, Victoria, New Westmin Library. ster, Nanaimo and Yale—were published by FIRE INSURANCE PLANS Sanborn in 1885. Today, they provide a unique Ever since the Babylonians recorded cadastral and fascinating record of the social and economic surveys on clay for taxation purposes over four activity of the period. thousand years ago specialized mapping has played an essential role in civilized society. GRANVILLE Insurance companies began making their own When Edward Stamp built a sawmill (later to Fire Insurance Plans of British cities in the early become the Hastings Mill) on the south shore of eighteenth century to enable underwriters to Burrard Inlet in 1865 (at the foot of today’s assess risk and establish premium and introduced Dunlevy Street) one “Gassy Jack” Deighton, them into North America around 1808. By 1876 recognizing the needs of millhands and visiting the systematic surveying and mapping of munici sailors, opened up shop nearby with a barrel of palities had become almost entirely turned over whiskey. The settlement which arose around his to bureaux which printed and distributed plans to establishment soon became known as “Gas subscribing companies. Dominating the field town’ In 1870, presumably to add an air of

Page 8 British Columbia Historical News ____

\—---- a’

•ce‘

r — — — — 2 71.*-q.

7

ri2 I, I 1 L x

A portion of the first Fire Insurance Plan of Vancouver, August 1885. Originally published by Sanborn Map & Publishing Co. Limited, repro WOO D (aráay) duced from an original print in Special Collec tions, University of British Columbia Library.

British Columbia Historical News Page 9 respectability, the community was officially named Granville after Britain’s Colonial Secre was reduced to ashes. Only the Mill, Fishery and tary, surveyed and subdivided into lots for sale. the new Regina Hotel on Water Street were ‘Gassy Jack” purchased Lot 1, Block 2 for $67.50 spared, with many of the survivors having time on which he build Deighton House. only to take to the waters of Burrard Inlet and the Another early arrival, Joseph Spratt, established safety of boats. Others were not so fortunate. Coal Harbour Fishery (just west of the present Building a new city began immediately. The Marine Building at the foot of Burrard Street). His first authorization of council was a civic loan for floating cannery, a 140-foot-long barge, was fire-fighting equipment and the construction of a known by locals as ‘Spratt’s Ark”: Spratt’s practice fire hall. Three years later, in 1889, the second Fire of fishing for herring with sticks of dynamite Insurance Plan of Vancouver, which now ran to eventually resulted in their total elimination from twenty sheets, reflected improved fire-fighting the harbour. facilities and construction practices which By 1885, aside from its two industries (Indivi without doubt enabled underwriters to sleep dual Risk Plans of which are inset on Sanborn’s better at nights. sheet), the townsite was limited to the block Copies of the map may be obtained from: bounded by Front, Water, Willow and Wood Map Society of British Columbia, Streets (Today’s Water, Carrall, Cordova and P.O. Box 301, Station A, Abbott Streets respectively). It boasted a popula Vancouver, B.C. V6C 2M7 tion of 300. “Gassy Jack”hacldieda decade earlier Cost: $3 per map plus $1 postage and handling. but Deighton House still flourished along with The Society can arrange to have maps hand two other hotels. Almost all the buildings were of colou red according to the original for a nominal frame construction with shake roofs and fire charge. fighting facilities could only be regarded as Initial response has been so good that the fire minimal. It is difficult to imagine any application plan map for Kamloops (1887) will be available for fire insurance being accepted with any degree early in 1986. of enthusiasm by an underwriter. Following the Fire of 1886 it was reportedthat “only a fewof the buildings were insured and those for only a fraction of their value”: VANCOUVER Before the end of 1885 rumour of a plan to re locate the western terminus of the Canadian Pacific Railway at Granville precipitated a boom in real estate. Neither William Van Home’s abandonment of Port Moody nor his choice of name for the new city was greeted enthusiastical ly by everyone. Nevertheless, on 6 April 1886 the Lieutenant-Governor gave royal assent to the incorporation of the City of Vancouver and Scholarship Fund notice of the first civic election was nailed to the Help us establish a scholarship for a 4th year maple tree on Water Street in front of Deighton student taking a major or honors course in House. Canadian history at a B.C. University. All dona Within eight months of Sanborn’s survey it is Lions are tax deductible. Please send your estimated that there were 1,000 buildings occu cheque today to: pied or under construction and that the popula The British Columbia Historical Federation tion had risen to 3,000. Scholarship Fund THE FIRE P.O. Box 35326 On the afternoon of Sunday June 13, 1886 at a site Station E being cleared on False Creek for the CPR Vancouver, B.C. V6M 4G5 roundhouse, a slash fire was burning. Fanned by a sudden change in wind it quickly grew out of control. Within less than half an hour Vancouver

Page 10 British Columbia Historical News James Patrick Regan

Hudson’s Bay Company Lands and Colonial Surveyors on Vancouver Island, 1842-1858

Vancouver Island’s first surveyor was Adolphus James Douglas’s greatest need, at this point in Lee Lewes, the country-born son of Chief Factor the development of his new colony, was to John Lee Lewes. The boy had been sent to determine the legal boundaries and nature of the England for his education and had entered the Hudson’s’ Bay Company land reserves, and its service of the Hudson’s Bay Company as “Sur subsidiary, the Puget’s Sound Agricultural Com veyor and Clerk for General Service.”1 He arrived pany farms. Good maps were also required to at Fort Vancouver in 1840 and accompanied Chief enable the Company to promote the sale of its Factor James Douglas to the future site of Fort lands. Grant’s work as a surveyor was unsatisfac Victoria at Camosack on the southern tip of tory, and Douglas had to write the Company in Vancouver Island in 1842.2 Lewes prepared a map London stating that he still had no sketches to titled, Ground Plan of portion of Vancouver send. Captain Grant did survey a portion of the Island selected for New Establishment taken by Victoria district in 1850, but wrote to James James Douglas, Esq. Drawn by A. tee Lewes, L.S.2 Douglas in September 1850, that “thick fog & This is the only known survey work by Lewes who smoke which at present overclouds the district” subsequently retired from the Hudson’s Bay made it impossible to carry on the survey.8 Company service in September, 1856. Captain Grant, seemingly our first tourist, then On January 13, 1849, “The Governor and departed to winter in the Sandwich Islands, and Company of Adventurers trading into Hudson’s left Vancouver Island for good in 1853. It is difficult not to feel some measure of sympathy for Bay ... [was granted] that Island called Vancou Grant—not only was he terribly undertrained for ver’s Island ... [as] the true and absolute Lords and a most demanding task, he was cursed with poor Proprietors ... in free and common soccageatthe yearly rent of seven shillings.” By the terms of the assistants, in contrast to J.D. Pemberton and his charter the Hudson’s Bay Company agreed to admirable assistant Benjamin William Pearse. establish a settlement on Vancouver Island and Joseph Despard Pemberton was born in Dublin towards this end a modest start was made the in 1821 and educated at Trinity College, Dublin. same year with the arrival at Fort Victoria of He was trained as an engineer and worked in this Captain Walter Colquhoun Grant and his eight capacity for several railways in Britain. He also men.5 Captain Grant had the distinction of being served for two years at the Royal Agricultural the only colonist on Vancouver Island in 1849 not College, Cirencester, Gloucestershi re, as Profes directly employed by the Company. In addition sor of Surveying, Civil Engineering and Mathema to being a putative settler, he had also been tics.1° He was appointed Colonial Surveyor to the appointed “Surveyor to the Company” with a Hudson’s Bay Company on February 15, 1851, and salary of £100 per annum.6 Captain Grant’s arrived in the Colony of Vancouver Island in June qualifications were somewhat vague and he was, of the same year. Pemberton and his assistant to say the least, irresponsible. He had arrived at started to lay out a townsite beside Fort Victoria Fort Victoria in June, 1849, after losing most of his and Esquimalt, and also started the long-awaited surveying instruments en route, and this unfor survey of the Hudson’s Bay Company land tunate occurrence seemed to set the tone for his reserves and farms. Pemberton was a trained subsequent careers on Vancouver Island, both as engineer, so documentation existed from the colonist and map-maker.7 beginning concerning his survey work. His

British Columbia Historical News Page 11 VICTORIA DISTRICT OFFICIAL MAP 1858 /9JZç)

eC. — r \ x ‘ I

OA K BAY L c1’

JUAN DE FUCA STRAIT

Puget’s Sound Agricultural Company Farms Sec. II & XXI Craigflower Farm Sec. X Constance Cove Farm Sec. Xl Viewfield Farm Sec. I (not shown) Esquimalt Farm Fur Trade Reserve Sec. XVIII H.B. Co’s Reserve No. 1 Sec. XXXI H.B. Co’s Reserve No. 2 Sec. XXXII H.B. Co’s Reserve No. 3

Map No. 1

Page 12 British Columbia Historical News notebook titled, “Trigonomtl. Memda” contains the pattern of section lines in this district vividly an entry dated November 25, 1851 that reads in illustrates the rather erratic arrangement of part: sections that result from the use of Pemberton’s system. Furnished jms Douglas with 3 A secondary reason for this seemingly haphazard arrangement small Plans of A. r. was that the first allot p. ments had been Reserve at Christmas Hill 640 0 surveyed as isolated parcels of 0 land, which were do at Cadboro Bay 1144 0 0 later tied together trigono metrically. A modern do at Victoria Fort 1300 0 0 surveyor has commented that “when the intervening allotments filled in Total 3084 0 0 the spaces between, a very kaleidoscopic which dispatched pattern are by steamer Mary Dare to resulted” (see Map No. 1).13 It should Nisqually tomorrow.11 be noted that in some areas of the Victoria Land District a James Douglas was delighted with the fast, modified grid pattern, similar to the 1849 Canter accurate work of his new surveyor and immedi bury Settlement of New Zealand, was used, ately mailed London the but to maps ot the above this regular grid was only possible in the Hudson’s area Bay Company Reserves. We shall have where no isolated allotments of land existed. occasion to refer to these maps later At in the paper. any rate, these early allotments of land later Prior to beginning his surveys, Pemberton had became known as “Sections” and, in the Victoria to make a basic decision regarding the type of Land District, are between 20 and 1212 acres in survey system best suited to the unique condi- size, a very substantial variation. tioris of the new Colony Vancouver of Island, Pemberton’s method of tying land units because the area to be mapped was quite rough together was to begin with a trigonometric and heavily wooded. He was well aware of the framework as recommended by Captain Frome. various systems used in different parts of the The first page of Pemberton’s notebook contains world to solve special problems in land surveys as, a surveyor’s sketch of the prominent elevations in for example, the United States system in which the Victoria district that were later used townships of 36 sections, with to 640 acres per establish bench marks for the area, and it may section, were then divided quarter-sections be into seen how these features were utilized by skilled of 160 acres. There were a other systems in use such surveyor (see Map No. 2).14 This trigonometric as the types employed in New Zealand and grid has been superimposed on Map No. Australia. Pemberton’s 3 of the In diary the following Victoria area and illustrates how this quotation grid topo is copied out in full. graphically defines the Victoria district. Sections One may laid out with frontages upon main have observed that the sight line between lines of Grants roads, rivers, or wherever increased Hill (probably Knockan Hill just above value is thereby conferred Portage upon the land, In let) and Mount Douglas eventually became the should have their frontage reduced to one- boundary between the Victoria Land District and half, or even one-third of the depth of the the Lake Land District (see Map No. section, so distribute 3). One as to this advantage should also notice that it is just north of among many this as as can participate in it, boundary, by Elk and Beaver Lake, that Pember without rendering the different sections too ton’s original system of surveying changed rather elongated in figure to be advantageously abruptly to a more orthodox system of rectilinear cultivated as farm.12 a form with the sides aligned to the cardinal This somewhat programmatic paragraph was directions. This change was probably because the taken from a monograph on surveying by Captain influx of gold seekers from California Frome increased of the Royal Engineers, who had been the urgency to survey large tracts of Surveyor land quickly. General of South Australia. In this text It has been observed that the initial survey Captain Frome recommended of the that prior to any Victoria and Lake Land Districts, which includes cadastral, i.e., boundary surveying, being carried all of present day Saanich, has more in common out, trigonometric surveys should be done with with New Zealand and Australia than with the rest the concomitant layout of roads and townsites— of North America.15 this road allowance was ignored by Pemberton While one must admit that the and is perhaps sizes and the reason so many of the roads in orientations of land allotments varied Saanich tend to wind in the all about the Peninsula.12 Victoria Land District, it was a much Because the Victoria Land District more was the first humanistic method than the monolithic grid area on lower Vancouver Island be to surveyed, favoured in the United States and on the Cana

British Columbia Historical News Page 13 dian Prairies. Western Canadian homesteader’s some “untidy” sections of land, but the philo accounts are filled with the various problems sophical background becomes, in some aspects as created by the Township system with its grid of least, apparent if one studies maps of the Victoria sections and quarter-sections. the Dominion Land District with some care. Pemberton agreed Township Grid system made no allowance for with Captain Frome that one should distribute topographical characteristics such as the natural any geographical advantages “among as many as ‘lay of the land’. It also had the unfortunate can participate in it.” Pemberton attempted to feature of tending to isolate the farming families split favourable geographical features such as lake just when they needed the maximum support frontages and water rights among several sec from neighbours. This was particularly true for the tions—this may be seen quite clearly in the women of the family, and the psychological toll divisions of land surrounding Swan and Blenkin was very heavy. sop Lakes in Saanich where the section lines In the Victoria district the earliest surveyed neatly bisect the lakes (see Map No. 3). A letter allotments were, as mentioned above, isolated written by J.D. Pemberton to Kenneth McKenzie parcels of land which were tied together as more indicates this concern; the key paragraph reads as and more allotments were sold. This trend is quite follows: noticeable in a study of the Hudson’s Bay I had one application for a patch of land near Company lands and farms. The plans completed Lake at Christmas Hill where I constantly see by Pemberton November 25, 1851, and given to your sheep grazing & refused to sell less than James Douglas, still exist in the original form, orat 100 acres in that place as it is impossible least very early copies, as does other documenta everywhere to give access to every small tion concerning the Reserve lands themselves. A allotment for it would not be right in that place true copy of the resolution requesting that these to cut off a large tract of grazing ground from lands be reserved for the Company are to be water.18 found in a set of bound folio Identures recording There is much to be said for this type of land grants within “Vancouver’s Island”.16 The surveying and land control as opposed to the resolution reads in part: somewhat dehumanizing grid used over most of January 30, 1854 Western Canada, but perhaps Pemberton’s Ordered that Lot No. 24 [this is an error, it system relied too much on the integrity of the should read Lot No. 18] containing 1212 person in charge to be practicable.19 It is interest acres, Lot No. 31, containing 1130 acres and ing that it was at another Hudson’s Bay colony that Lot 32 containing 710 acres being land the ubiquitous grid form of survey was modi occupied by the Company prior to the fied—this occurred at the Metis settlement at Boundary Treaty of 1846 be entered in the White Horse Plain, now St. Francois-Xavier, Land Register of Vancouver’s Island, as Manitoba, founded in 1823, just twenty years directed by the Minute of 26th. September prior to the building of Fort Victoria in 1843. The last. basis for the land divisions in this area was that of Hudson’s Bay House, A True Copy the Quebec river lots, and the river lots at St. January 7th. 1859 Francois-Xavier, running back at an angle to the These reserves are registered as “H.B. Co. Assiniboine River, still survive almost unchanged Reserves No’s. I, II and Ill”. The Hudson’s Bay from the original land grants.2° Deeds also carry a record of the four Puget’s Maps are fascinating documents because they Sound Agricultural Company farms and names of are a concrete record of man’s attempts to make the respective bailiffs (see Appendix A). In order sense of and to order his world. “For Herodatus to gain a more vivid impression as to the amount geography was the ‘eye of history’,” and our of land reserved by the Hudson’s Bay Company to topographical maps delineate both space and itself, Map No. 1 should again be consulted; as time.21 Maps give concrete expression to the may be seen it covered a substantial area, 6018 philosophical and political realities of the day—in acres. At least some of the Company’s land was other words the historical process that result in held for almost a century; the Puget’s Sound what is seen around us today. In the case of J.D. Agricultural Society, Ltd. was still in existence in Pemberton, it is possible to trace some of the 1927, and parts of Craigflower Farm were being concepts behind the actual mechanics of the sold in 1933.17 maps covering the Victoria and Lake Land Pemberton’s system of surveying resulted in Districts.22 These maps are a part of the historical

Page 14 British Columbia Historical News L l’t. Doup]as J

[Inockan Hill?)

Grants HiLl j30 bri stmas

.fs Tolmi e 87’2O’ LMt. Tomi ]

U Copy of first page from notebook of J.D. Pemberton 1,-i tit)ed: “Trigonometi. Meida.” The Sketch is possibjy dated to 1851. Victoya land (note that aLl distances District are ca3cu]ated in links. (compare this trigonor-Etrj0 1 3ink grid = 7.92”) with Map No. 3) -‘

beacon LIieacon Hill

evidence of the different traditions behind the Sec. No. XXI, Victoria Land District, folio 97, 600 settlement of lower Vancouver Island compared acres to the Canadian Prairies—as Margaret Ormsby CONSTANCE COVE FARM—Thomas Skinner, wrote, “More than mountains separated Canada [Esquimalt] and British Columbia.”23 On Vancouver Island Sec. No. X, Lot 28, Esquimalt Land District, folio 91, particularly, there never had been a “typical 600 acres North American frontier settlement.” Settlement VIEWFIELD FARM—Donald Macauley, [Esqui arrived by sea, with scarcely any change. It is only malt] fitting that this Colonial, water-borne tradition Sec. No. XI, Lot 29, Esquimalt Land District, folio had been expressed by the system of surveying 94, 600 acres used by Joseph Despard Pemberton, and that evidences are imprinted in the section boun Fur Trade Reserves: daries of Greater Victoria. HUDSON’S BAY COMPANY RESERVE NO. I, [James Bay] APPENDIX A Sec. No. XVIII, Victoria Land District, folio 73,1212 Lands Reserved by the Hudson’s Bay Company acres Puget’s Sound Agricultural Company Farms: HUDSON’S BAY COMPANY RESERVE NO. II, ESQUIMALT FARM—Captain Edward Langford, [Oak Bay] [Colwood] Sec. No. XXXI, Victoria Land District, folio 100, Sec. No. I, Lot 26, Esquimalt Land District, folio 82, 1130 acres acres 620 HUDSON’S BAY COMPANY CRAIGFLOWER RESERVE NO. III, FARM—Kenneth McKenzie, [Saanich] [Esquimalt] Sec. No. XXXII, Victoria Sec. No. Land District, folio 103, II, Esquimalt Land District, folio 88, 546 710 acres acres CRAIGFLOWER FARM—Kenneth McKenzie, All the above information was taken from the [Saanich] following: Vancouver’s island Colony: Regis ter Book No. 1.

British Columbia Historical News Page 15 MAP3 8. Captain Walter Coiquhoun Grant, Letter to James Douglas, September 10, 1850, quoted in full in Ireland, pp. 49-50. — iIJTW SAAMIC1I LAATh bISZ!k1Cr - LA (Sri IC 9. Ormsby, p. 116. 10. Ireland, p. 50. 11. Joseph Despard Pemberton, Surveying Notebook I titled: “Trigonometl Memda.” ADD MSS 1978, PA BC. 12. quoted in W.A. Taylor, Survey Systems within the Crown Domain: Colonies to Confederation, IlL ([Victoria, Dept. of Lands, I B.C.1: Forests and Water Resources of B.C., 1975), p. 2. I was unable to verify the quotation in Pemberton. - U DOL) •Ii 12a. Captain [Edward Charles] Frome, Outline of the Method of Conducting a Trigonometrical Survey for the Formation of Geographical and Topo graphical Maps and Plans: (London: J. Weale, K.IC J LL 1840, [rpt.] 1850). N Cited in Taylor, p. 2, but the above work was not available for verification. 13. Taylor, p. 4. 14. Pemberton, “Trigonometi. Memda,” [p. 1]. - OA1 t3,V 15. Lorne Hammond, unpublished paper, “Early Land Ownership in Saanich: A Report Prepared for the British Columbia Heritage Trust,” (Victoria. vJcT IA B.C.: August 15, 1985), p. 4.

E5cLJIM LT 16. Vancouver’s Island Colony: addendum to folio 99. 17. Hudson’s Bay Company, Letter to the Corpora SCncc .34 I- tion of the District of Saanich, January 18, 1927, / Vertical file: “Craigflower School,” Saanich Archives, Victoria, B.C. Letter to the Corporation of the District of Saanich, June 3, 1933, Vertical file: “Hudson’s Bay Company,” Saanich Archives, Victoria, B.C. 18. Joseph Despard Pemberton, Letter to Kenneth McKenzie, June 18, 1856, Correspondence Out ward, A/E/M19/P361, PABC. 19. see Lewis C. Thomas, ed. The Prairie West to 1905: Notes A Canadian Sourcebook, (Toronto: Oxford 1. Willard E. Ireland, “Pioneer Surveyors of Vancou University Press, 1975), p. 225, for some of the ver Island,” In The Report of Proceedings of the problems that later arose in Alberta over water 46th. Annual General Meeting of the Corporation rights and livestock. ot B.C. Land Surveyors, (Victoria, B.C.: January 11- 20. W.L. Morton, Manitoba: A History, (Toronto, 12, 1951), p. 47. Ont: University of Toronto Press, 1957, rpt. 1979), 2. Margaret Ormsby, British Columbia: A History, p. 155. 21. Elizabeth Eisenstein, The (Vancouver, B.C.: Macmillans in Canada, 1958), p. Printing Revolution in 80. Early Modern Europe, (New York, N.Y.: Cam 3. Ireland, p. 47. bridge University Press, 1983), p. 127. 4. Province of British Columbia, Surveys and Lands 22. Province ot British C •Iumbia, Map: Victoria Branch, Vancouver’s Island Colony: Register District Official Map 1858, CM/D49. Map: Lake Book No. 1, [Victoria, B.C. c. 1858]), Fol[io] 100. District. O.M. 1862, CM/C715, PABC. 5. Ormsby, p. 99. 23. Ormsby, p. 257. 6. Ireland, 48. p. James Patrick Regan is an archivist with the Saanich 7. Ormsby, p. 100. Municipality.

British Columbia Historical News Page 16 R.G. Patterson

Roger Peachey, M.C. The Last Commissioner of the British Columbia Provincial Police Force

Roger Peachey was born on October 19, 1892, in London, England. After finishing his schooling he took clerical training. Shortly thereafter, he emigrated to Canada and Alberta, where he put his talents to work. At the outbreak of World War I, Peachey enlisted in the 3rd Battalion, Canadian Mounted Rifles on January 7, 1915, at Medicine Hat, Alberta. He trained in Canada and England and landed in France on September 22, 1915. After nineteen months in the field, he was recom mended for a commission, and attended Officer Training Course at St. Omer in France and Bexhill in England. After training, Lieutenant Peachey returned to France and saw action until August 8, 1918, when at Hangard, leading a party of scouts and snipers of the 1st Battalion, Canadian Mounted Rifles, he suffered severe hand grenade wounds. He spent a month in hospital at Rouen, before being allowed to return to England for further recuper ation. For this action, he was awarded the Military Cross on October 7, 1918. During his three years service in France, he was wounded twice, lost a leg as a result of his wounds, and saw action in all the major campaigns of the War, including Vimy Ridge. Lieutenant Peachey was invalided back to Canada on May 21, 1919, and given his final discharge papers in Victoria on October 21, 1919. Commissioner Roger Peachey, M.C. On May 12, 1920 Roger Peachey joined the Headquarters staff of the British Columbia Provincial Police Force as a Clerk/Constable under Corporal W.J. Voisey, the head of the newly created Criminal Identification Depart ment.

British Columbia Historical News Pagel7 The year 1923 marks a watershed in the history 1/4/24 Appointed First Class Constable and development of the Provincial Police Force. 1/4/26 Appointed Acting Corporal I/C During that year the Province enacted the Police Records and Prisons Regulation Act. By this act, the Force 1/4/27 Promoted to Sgt. Criminal underwent a total reorganization. A further result Investigation Branch, Victoria was the creation of the Criminal Investigation 1/4/30 Promoted to Staff Sgt. Branch on January 1, 1924. 1/4/36 Promoted to Sub-Inspector Roger Peachey was commissioned into the 1/8/40 Promoted to Inspector Force in 1936 and four years later became the 1/11/47 Promoted to Deputy Commissioner head of the Criminal Investigation Branch. Once 1/3/50 Promoted to Commissioner head of the Branch, he improved its stature to the 15/8/50 Discharged from the Force point where it had (for its day) the best photo- B.C. Provincial Police taken over by the Royal graphic and fingerprint technology, an up-to- Canadian Mounted Police on August 15, 1950. firearms registry, a modas operandi section, date R.G. Patterson is a curator with the Modern quality specialists in ballistics and other and top History Division, British Columbia Provincial available for police investigation work. sciences Museum. During the Second War, Deputy Commission- er Peachey was a member of the Joint Services Security Intelligence Board. Its principal function was to co-ordinate the work of the tn-services and the police forces in preserving the security of Canada’s Pacific Coast. This work was over and above his police work. Like his predecessors, Peachey worked his way up through the ranks of the Force, always remaining in the same branch, to become Commissioner of the Force on March 1, 1950. He held the post for four and one-half months, until the Force was taken over by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police on August 15, 1950. Rather than transferring to the R.C.M.P. as the majority of the members of the Force did, Peachey took early retirement. Shortly thereafter, he became Civil Defence co-ordinator for the Greater Victoria area. He held this, and related posts until resigning in 1957. Once he was completely retired, Peachey took up golf, and often could be found traversing from putting green to putting green, with better than average results. This he pursued up until the day of his death which was July 10, 1964. From all that one reads and gathers through talking to members of the Force, Peachey was not a flamboyant policeman, in fact just the oppo site—quiet and unobtrusive, but highly efficient, DOfl t Forget! in fact a “real gentleman” in the true sense of the word. Subscribe now if you’re not receiving the News regularly. ADDENDUM British Columbia Provincial Police Promotion Record of Roger Peachey: First Appointed to the Force May 12, 1920, Victoria, Clerk/Constable

Historical News Page 18 British Columbia Jacqueline Gresko

A 1912 New Westminster Sampler

The following excerpts from the New Westmin treatment of them in favour of his prime con ster British Columbian are the results of applying cerns: British Imperialism and local progress. Patricia Roy’s suggested Miniature Exercise in Some excerpts from student papers include: Historical Research (Canadian Historical Associa February 7, 1912 (Vancouver Province as well as tion Newsletter Summer 1984) in a first year Columbian) stories detailed the building of a flour History course at Douglas College. This assign and oatmeal mill and terminal elevator at Port ment required students to read one issue of the Mann. Mr. F.A. Bean, president, International 1912 British Columbian assigned by individual Milling Co., had just announced the proposal. In birthdates. Students were to use this source, plus the Province, lots at Port Mann were advertised at periodical articles and books, to discuss the life $150 a lot, $5 down, 5 months with no taxes and no and times of New Westminster and district in interest. City workers’ wages had gone up to $3 1912. Students could write an essay or a letter to per day from $2.80, according to the British an imaginary correspondent about a trip to New Columbian. Westminster in 1912. The Board of Trade gave a complimentary When the papers came in to be marked I noted banquet to Sir Donald Mann, “the railroad the usual problems with English composition. It builder whose name [was] the magic sesame loan was uplifting, however, to see that students had era of progress and development the likes of enjoyed doing original research and had made which the city had not yet experienced.” New some attempts at analysis of their sources. Some Westminster would become the “heart and students with the help of college or New West centre of a great industrial region”. The Province minster Public Library staff looked at the Van echoed this news from the New Westminster couver Province, the Coquitlam Star, or the paper with an article on “Great Prosperity Financial Post. A few students interviewed Predicted for Royal City.” oldtimers about the construction schemes of the Newcomers were already doing well according pre-war boom period. One student considered to a front page Columbian story about the the B.C. Orange Lodge 50th Anniversary parade petition sent to the Honourable R. Rogers, attended by 10,000 as his most interesting “find”. federal minister of the Interior, from Hindus and Another regarded the Temperance movement as Sikhs in Vancouver. They were “doing very well as hers. Nearly every student exulted in advertise a community” and, they asked if their families ments; e.g., for Kamloops as the Los Angeles of could join them. That reunion would be “an act of Canada, for the Palace of Sweets on Columbia moral and civil justice which every well-wisher of Street, New Westminster, for the Edison Theatre society would desire.” [See The Canadian Family presentation of ‘The Coming of Columbus’ as Tree, 1979, p. 112. Between 1909 and 1913 only 29 endorsed by ‘Educators, Press, Pulpit, Historians, Sikhs were admitted to Canada.] and the Public’. Vancouver Province July 10, 1912, advertise Student compositions on New Westminster ment for development of Hardy Bay boasted of a and district from the British Columbian included bridge to be built from the mainland to the Island essays spread through the year. In keeping with across Seymour Narrows. the focus of our local history course, the essays Financial Post July 13, 1912, “Real Estate in the discussed themes of community, class and race. West Nearing a Crisis” headlined one article, Community or local boosterism and race or anti- while another, “The Half Year in Real Estate oriental sentiments were more evident than class Investment”, included a table showing prices in conflicts. No doubt, the British Columbian editor, British Columbia cities higher than those in other Conservative J.D. Taylor, had limited his paper’s regions of Canada.

British Columbia Historical News Page 19 October 1, 1912, the real estate boom contin ued. A small house on 160 acres in Alberta was advertised for the same price as a bare lot on Eighth Street, New Westminster. The Brunette Sawmill Co. had purchased the street along the Writing Competition river from the city for private use in order to expand. Job advertisements for women were mainly housekeeping positions and for men mainly construction work. In social life, lodges such as the Sons of Scotland and the Orangemen predominated. Soccer, The British Columbia Historical Federation invites cricket, croquet and lacrosse merited mention in submission of books or articles for the third the sports columns. The Provincial Exhibition annual competition for writers of British Colum began October 1 but the Duke and Duchess of bia History. Connaught would formally open it October 3. Any book with historial content published in The Columbian boosted it as the largest in 1986 is eligible. Whether the work was prepared Western Canada. as a thesis or a community project, for an industry In international headlines the “Balkans [were] or an organization, or just for the pleasure of on the Brink of War”. sharing a pioneer’s reminiscences, it is considered history as long as names, dates and locations are included. Stories told in the vernacular are acceptable when indicated as quotations of a story teller. Writers are advised that judges are looking for fresh presentation of historical information with relevant maps and/or pictures. A Table of Contents and an adequate Index are a must for the book to be of value as a historical reference. A Bibliography is also desirable. Proof Back Issues of the News reading should be thorough to eliminate typo graphical and spelling errors. Submit your book with your name, address, Back issues of the News can be ordered at $3.50 and telephone number to: each plus postage from the Editor. British Columbia Historical Federation c/o Mrs. Naomi Miller Box 105 Wasa, B.C. VOB 2K0 Please include the selling price of the book and an address from where it may be purchased.

******

There will also be a prize for the writer of the best Thinking of Publishing? historical article published in the British Colum bia Historical News quarterly magazine. Articles are to be submitted directly to: A seminar on publishing local history, given by The Editor Helen Akrigg, may be arranged for your British Columbia Historical News historical society. Please contact Leonard G. 1745 Taylor Street McCann, #2, 1430 Maple Street, Vancouver, Victoria, B.C. V8R 3E8 V6J3R9. Written length should be no more then 2,500 words, substantiated with footnotes if possible, and accompanied by photographs if available. Deadlines for the quarterly issues are September 1, December 1, March 1, and June 1.

Page 20 British Columbia Historical News C.L. Hansen-Brett

LADIES IN SCARLET: An Historical Overview of Prostitution in Victoria, British Columbia 1870-1939

In the past, prostitution was often ignored as a house address appear in connection with prosti topic for research, not only because it concerned tution, in the soon-to-be-notorious Chatham women but because those women were de Herald Street district. valued members of society. “Prostitution has Prior to 1870, most prostitution seems to have been tolerated throughout much of western been conducted by native Indian women. As history, but because of its ‘unspeakable’ stigma Fisher observes for this early period, tized and clandestine nature, it has been largely Large numbers of Indian women from the unrecorded.”1 Serious interest in women’s history north came to Victoria annually to earn money is only a recent phenomenon, and prostitution, as by prostitution. Apparently some were able to a part of that history and as a social and economic raise their husband’s social position with the reality, is worthy of study. The subject of prostitu wealth that they acquired in this way. Women tion is a difficult one to research, but by relying could earn twice as much as prostitutes in predominantly upon Victoria City Police archival Victoria as they could further up the coast.2 documents this article will attempt to trace the In the Victoria City Police charge books history of prostitution in Victoria from the 1870s examined for the 1870s and 1880s, the only record through the 1930s. A chronological approach will of prostitution concerns soliciting by native outline prostitution in the context of other types women. A typical notation is the following: “April of criminal offences, locations of prostitution 7, 1873, Lucy a Hydah Indian woman charged by activity, ethnic and other characteristics of Inspector Bowden with being on the public street prostitutes, and prevailing community attitudes. at the hour of 1:00 a.m. for the purposes of In addition, attention will be given to social and prostitution.” economic circumstances underlying the choice Prostitution does not seem to have been of prostitution as a viable occupation, considered as more than a minor offence. Women charged with soliciting were discharged Prior to 1900 the same day, or the following day at the latest, Typical charges of the last three decades of the with no fines imposed. In contrast, fourteen days’ 19th century, as noted in the Victoria City Police hard labour was the usual sentence for theft by charge books, include desertion by sailors, males and females, native or non-native. Drunk assault, being a “rogue and a vagabond” and most and disorderly carried the most severe penalty, common, drunk and disorderly. Charges for particularly for native women: prostitution appear infrequently, and are often March 25, 1876, jennie an Indian woman combined with drunk and disorderly arrests. charged with drunk and disorderly. Sentence Indeed, during the 1890s more charges are laid 14 days in gaol on half food rations and to be against men as “frequenters” or “habitual confined in a dark cell every second day. frequenters” of brothels than against prostitutes. Charges against frequenters were more often Records for the 1870s and 1880s would seem to than not dismissed, but habitual frequenters indicate that most prostitution was in the form of received a fifty-dollar fine. street soliciting. Not until May 16, 1894, does a In 1892, “keeping a house of ill-fame” was an

British Columbia Historical News Page 21

Page 22

News Historical Columbia British

by annoyed men getting and that yard into her only succeeded Morley that appears However, it

which she lodges a is that “she complaint district.. Light Red the of the elimination

able notoriety on Street, living in Broughton notably changes, been important have there issue

a telephone message a consider of woman from moral the “On slavery. white of the city rid having

clientele. The police book report 1915, records in of boasted He Victoria. in prostitution up of

controlled businesses, and of their selective were clean a major instigated Mayor Morley 1906-07,

“carriage trade” as houses carefully class, high In area. Street Douglas and Courtney Broughton,

red velvet. The “Ladies the Scarlet” in operated the in located were clientele, prosperous more

district, visible were about town, dressed in often a to catering houses, trade” “carriage Herald,

unlike the Chinese “red in women light” the and Chatham on ‘red-light’ district lower-class

The women in the houses, “carriage trade” the to addition In Victoria. in early prostitution

passers-by. of classes two been to have appear There

making and lewd to suggestive comments madams. the to out rented and were Chinese”

stand at their windows and for notorious were the of hands the in were “principally area this in

Records that indicate would Chinese women prostitution of houses The town.” part of toughest

appeared the in books. charge the about [1903], time that at was, Chatham and

and for reasons unknown, their never names Herald of vicinity the in lying district “the recalled

rently

were they allowed brothels, not the out of 1911, 6, April Colonist, The locale. and Chatham

Although Chinese appa were women inmates, Herald the in particularly a problem, major still

and women Chinese men as were keepers. cited disorderly and drunk with charge books, Police

In

the Herald Chatham and Street white area, City Victoria in the offences cited commonly

up

gang the

on customer roll and him. most the were use or possession opium and

by

one joined or two other who would women Gambling Street. to Discovery Street Cormorant

on Johnson

Street

then be she where would from area the in centered became disorderly

a

would woman take

E&N man bridge the under and drunk and prostitution, offences, related

apparently in worked

A Indian single gangs. opium- Gambling, Victoria. areas in crime

specific

The

native

the women,

who solicited streets of development the saw the century of turn The

women

and very rarely,

native women. 1900 After

consist mainly of a white, few Chinese and black

The ethnic to appears breakdown of prostitutes temptation. of scenes sources and from distance

of street soliciting this at time. some at kept be that should women fallen

not to required evidence little relocate. is There reasoned officials Union Christian Temperance

operate quietly were the in and downtown area, Women’s 1880’s. Perhaps the in of late prostitution

ever, to trade” the “carriage continued houses centres main from the blocks five approximately

to houses Chatham How the and areas. Herald was Home Refuge The woman” unfortunate

at Morley’s urging,

prostitution confined which

the of

care the and the fallen the of rescue

. •

In a 1911—12, was imposed, “restricted district” for Victoria St., at Work 2 Home the Refuge

city, in mostly areas. residential opened Union Temperance Christian Women’s

closed. the were These throughout scattered the 1889 in However, complaints. community

and 36 houses inmates arrested and were of decades three these during record no is there

dealing 33 In keepers the social with evil, some and police, by problem a as serious regarded

stated, Langley been have to appear not does Prostitution

j.M. areas. In dential Police Report, Chief’s the annoyance. public of fact the was offence the

regarding Police of test resi bawdy in located houses the words, other In be annoyance. 4 an to as

City were residents by received being Victoria the house bawdy a of operation the with or soliciting,

1910 and In by 1911 major Victoria complaints street with associated was when only law it

he be and see did why not they closed. should the with conflict into came Law, and Common

saying [sic] places these orderly were run English in an as offence not regarded itself ... was

as A quietly Police quoted is Commissioner prostitution that is interesting is What dollars. ... fifty

they on but ran never closed, actually to twenty-five of fines in resulted and frequenters

1907, but the Times reports inmates against charges $75.00 while to $100.00

houses trade” in supposedly also were closed, of a fine in resulted of a ill-fame house keeping

of outside “carriage the downtown area. The indicate City records Police Victoria ment. 3

in the areas the moving prostitutes residential into year’s to imprison one subject offence indictable Th’ ‘carriage trade” area appears to have been quietly and more tastefully run, according to community standards of the time, thereby causing little concern to the police or to the public in general. Although there were occasion al complaints logged in the Police report books regarding alleged houses of ill-fame in residential areas, and most of the complaints seem to have no substance, it appears that houses in the downtown area were, if not accepted, at least condoned. However, the profession of prostitu tion and the women themselves were not part of acceptable society. The local Council of Women was a powerful group who submitted many petitions opposing prostitution to the Legislature and to City Hall. The response from the Legisla ture is unknown, but it is suspected that City Hall didn’t pay much attention. Since City Hall had a vested financial interest in houses of prostitution, the lack of interest in the petitions is understand able. The women who managed the houses in the “red light” area were at the mercy of the landlords, most of whom appear to have been Chinese. In some cases the owner lived on the premises to ensure collections of the rent. The amount of rent paid by the keepers came to light in 1910 in an enquiry regarding the Police Commissioners “. . . The rents were extortionate, the owners having women in their power owing to the limited number of houses.” With the exception of the “carriage trade” houses, houses of ill-fame could operate only in the restricted area. Four keepers of houses in that area testified at the enquiry. Rents for houses were reported from $150.00 to $500.00 per month. she had not let them in.” Sergeant Clayards writes One allegation at the enquiry was that high rents underneath, “some she lets in and some she were charged because part of the money went to doesn’t.” the Police Commissioners as protection money. appear have quasi- Houses of prostitution to a “... It was suggested that as ... the rents were so business status at this time. Apparently there was out of all proportion, a fair inference would be an agreement among the madams of the “car that the landlord was contributing out of the rent riage trade” house, City Hall officials, and the City for the purposes of protection.” One of the Police. Because City Hall could not collect keepers stated that “she had heard that people legitimate business licence fees from these ‘running downtown’ had protection. She had houses, the police raided them twice a year and been harassed while others were let alone.” The the owners or keepers were fined $100.00 in lieu outcome of the enquiry was that no acts of of license fees. bribery were established. The Chatham and Herald Street area did not Not all residents looked on prostitution with appear to have the same agreement. The same disdain. W. Marchant, a columnist for the Vitoria houses were raided frequently with no apparent Times in 1910, suggested that houses of ill-fame consistency in time or fines. Keepers were should be legalized. He acknowledged “the charged $75.00 to $100.00, inmates $25.00 to degradation of womanhood” but suggested the $50.00, and frequenters $25.00 to $50.00. A high government should protect the earnings of proportion of the charges resulted in warrants prostitutes and exercise supervision. He further issued with no subsequent action recorded. stated,

British Columbia Historical News ought to be taken in hand by their parents or juvenile officers. Charges relating to procuring juveniles for the purpose of prostitution were harshly dealth with: Sept. 15, 1910 Fred R. did unlawfully inveigle or entice one Florence I. a woman under the age of 21 to a house of ill-fame or assignation at 5½ Chatham for the purpose of illicit intercourse. Sentence: 1 year imprisonment of hard labour. In the 1920s Victoria City Police were making an extreme effort to close down gambling houses in the restricted area. The charge books list up to fifty people arrested in one gambling raid. The raids in 1923 resulted in a substantial number of arrests, often once a month, for gambling. Indecent exposure and indecent assault became fairly common in the 1920s as did charges relating to juveniles. Women, for the first time, were being charged with opium and cocaine posses sion, and procuring abortions was also cited with come frequency. Keepers of gambling houses were fined $100.00, while guests of the houses were fined fifteen to twenty dollars. Indecent exposure resulted in fines of $25.00 to $50.00, while women charged with procuring abortions were sen tenced to one year in prison. Charge records regarding drug possession reveal that a warrant was issued, but further information is unre corded. Charges relating to prostitution in brothels The brutal callousness of robbing the fallen virtually disappears by 1924 with hotels being woman of the very earnings for which she had commonly cited as replacements. With the entered the gates of hell is so despicable that instigation of prohibition in 1917, most of the language has not been inventedstrong enough hotels were suffering financially. Many went to portray it. broke, but, gradually reopened and became Although City Hall officials and Police do not bawdy houses. appear to have been overly concerned with the The Occidental Hotel, 1319 Wharf Street and removal of prostitution, they were concerned the Western Hotel on Store Street, regarded as about juvenile prostitution and about the num the location of better-class prostitutes, and the ber of young women who were frequenting the Strand Hotel on Johnson Street, where lower- Herald Street area in the evening. class prostitutes worked, appear to have become The annual crop of young girls who are the main centres for prostitution. allowed to stay out at night were in evidence in Black women from the United States were the past year and a numberof cases were called appearing in the city in the 1920s with some to the attention of our officers who, in most regularity and notoriety. Black women were cases took them home, only to see them back usually madams of brothels and seem to have around their old haunts viz.auto and fruit operated business-like establishments. A black stands. woman who sold her brothel in Alaska, moved to This concern continued, as noted in the Report Victoria and succeeded in operating a chain of of the City Detective Dept., January 1917. brothels. The brothels were located in Langley, It is rather deplorable to see so many [young Duncan and the Occidental Hotel in Victoria. She girls] on the street at night with their latest also built a house for the purpose of prostitution make-ups [sic] on, talking and mixing with on the outskirts of Victoria. This house, known entire strangers. This class of the community then as The Chantecler and now as Fort Victoria,

Page 24 British Columbia Historical News contained closet-size rooms with hidden doors that could not be seen from the outside. The present owners of Fort Victoria mention finding these rooms and that they were accessible only from the attic. It would appear that when a raid was to occur, the woman had an arrangement with the Provincial Police whereby she would be notified, giving time for inmates and frequenters to hide. During the depression of the ‘30s, charges for prostitution decline markedly. A typical charge of the depression years is for “being a loose and idle person ... who did unlawfully wander around and beg.” Being intoxicated in a public place, particularly by native Indians, occurs with some frequency and indecent exposure and indecent assault continue. In the 1936 and 1937 charge books examined, there were no prostitution or prostitution-related charges recorded. Neverthe less, prostitution was still in existence, and hotels were still the major location of brothels. They do not appear to be located in a specific area, and as Given the economic circumstances in Victoria, in the early 1900s, some hotel brothels were of prostitution was one of the few alternatives open better class than others. The rapport between the to women workers. Options available for working police and prostitutes or madams is unknown, as women included low-paying, unskilled menial police report books for this period are unavail work, prostitution and marriage. Whether wid able. owed with children to support, deserted, sed The discussion to this point has presented a uced under promise of marriage and then cast chronological account of some of the major aside, or disgraced by illegitimate pregnancy, characteristics of prostitution in Victoria from women entered prostitution for survival. In a 1870 through the 1930s. Undoubtedly, the world of limited employment opportunities for depression of the thirties created as severe women, they perceived prostitution as a rational economic hardships for prostitutes as it did for economic choice. It afforded them higher wages, other segments of society. However, for prosti shorter hours and a camaraderie with women in a tutes, economic hardship was probably a reality similar situation. Some women perceived prosti throughout Victoria’s history and in all likelihood tution as a means of upward mobility.7 Some, too, may be regarded as a major contributing factor to perceived prostitution as the only option avail women entering this occupation. able for the “fallen woman” whose virtue had Prostitution as an occupation may be seen as an been lost to rape or to seduction. “The brothel indictment of the limited range of opportunities served as a warehouse for damaged property.” that late nineteenth and early twentieth-century Thus, the major causes of prostitution during the women faced in their daily struggle for economic, period under discussion were economic: actual social and psychological well-being. Most women poverty, fragile family economics, the need for chose to enter prostitution not because they were supplemental income, and lack of, or contempt mentally deficient, not because they suffered for, other occupation options.9 unresolved Oedipal complexes, not because they Denied access to social and economic power were the helpless victims of sinister procurers, nor because of their gender and class status, poor because they were merely passive individuals, but women made their choices from a vulnerable because they perceived prostitution as a means of position of socially-structured powerlessness. All fulfilling particular economic, social or psycholo too often, a woman had to choose from an array gical needs. “Female labour in Vancouver of dehumanizing alternatives: to sell her body in a [and no doubt in Victoria] was restricted to loveless marriage contracted solely for economic occupations of a low-paying and expendable protection, to sell her body for starvation wages as nature.6 an unskilled worker, or to sell her body as a “lady

British Columbia Historical News Page 25

26

Page Historical Columbia British News

possible.

as

soon as Box

P.O. Federation

to

the sent be Society, a Member through or individually, either members,

Federation from

suggestions that asks committee This recommendations. make and situation the

to examine

committee

marketing and a publication appointed has Council Federation Historical The

steadily.

eroded being

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1984 from restraint government

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In magazine.

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Association Historical B.C. then the to by members Up espaid fees to 1983

year.

particular any for accurate

fully not are

so numbers

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financial the of

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5,142

1,250 3,270 67 32 458 22 Nov. to 1985

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11,853 3,333 4,832 98 61 772 1983-84

9,982 3,333 4,406 97 80

1198 1982-83

$

7,541 $3,333 $3,325 97 57 1180 1981-82

Cost

Publication

Grant Amount Total Institutional Individual Member Subscribers

table: the following to drawn is News Historical Columbia of British of The all readers attention The

News Historical Columbia the British Financing

p.

xi. Ltd., Press 1983), Hopkins and Esquimalt.

John

The

(London:

Sisterhood Lost 1. R. The Rosin, Victoria, and for the Oak Bay of Municipalities

the establish Police of City the for Archives Notes:

University of to and recently Victoria,

helped

of guardians virtue.”

Lacey

a is Hansen-Brett in student the History at

efficient were most ultimate “the Prostitutes

them. to upon moral the placed expectations

prostitution. with

up

to

live

failed would they how be they treated if

charged of women are shots mug The photographs

of

and table become women might of they what

paper. this in recorded are not names full ment,

to respec were They reminders object-lessons.

Depart

Police City of the At Victoria request the

moral of the position held Socially, prostitutes

Archives. City Police Victoria the from tained

occupations.

ob was information footnoted, Unless otherwise

they would socially-acceptable in more have had

p. 147. 9. Sisterhood, Lost Rosin,

than more prostitution from disposable income

8. Ibid. had many and in the consumers marketplace

p. were brothels. themselves women the Finally, 1, 84. no. 7, 1984) Press, Vol.

Eden Studies (Montreal: of Women’s Journal of part of an was integral alcohol sumption

International of the Prostitution,” Functions as con the tion. served were interests Liquor

On Betrayal: and 7. “Brothels M.E. Hawkesworth, prostitu to from revenues due viable businesses

remained 1980). Hotels, particularly prohibition, during College, Camosun Latham (Victoria:

B. Right, ed. Own Her In fees. 1900-1920,” Vancouver, of in licence form the lieu fines in of paid

in Prostitution Evil, 6. Social “The D. Nilsen, to City the Victoria income essential an provided

p. of City the in Prostitution function. economic Sisterhood, 5. 137. Lost Rosin,

an they important in held society, in but actuality

p.

Ibid.,

12.

4.

no place as outcasts They with were characterized

p.

12.

ostracism. of cost family, and often community,

1968), Inc., Press AMS (New City New York: York

social the cally suffered they from prostitution,

in

its and Repression 3.

Prostitution W. Waterman,

economi profited generally women Although

P.

113.

1977),

of

Press, Columbia British University

be to was

prostitution likely

involved.

(Vancouver: and Conflict Fisher, 2. Contact R.

of in form scarlet”. some choice, the Whatever News and Notes

British Columbia Vancouver Historical Society Historical Federation 1986 PROGRAMME January 22 Annual Conference “Vancouver Mayors 1: “Gerry McGeer” - David Williams The Vancouver Historical Society will be host to Arguably Vancouver’s greatest mayor (1935-6, the British Columbia Historical Federation’s 1947), the flamboyant Gerald Gratton McGeer annual conference, May 8, 9 and 10, 1986. read the riot act to Vancouver unemployed in Conference sessions will be held at the Gage 1935, hosted the city’s 50th birthday celebrations Towers on the University of British Columbia in 1936, and was responsible for the erection of campus. There is easy access and parking. The the new City Hall and the fountain in Lost Lagoon. Student Union Building is nearby for inexpensive February 27 meals. “Vancouver Mayors 2: Art Phillips” - Art Phillips Speakers will be Maria Tippett, Leonard Political reminiscences of the founder and first McCann and Frances Woodward, while the president of TEAM (The Electors’ Action Move dinner speaker is Charles Humphries. A panel of ment). Currently B.C.’s Commissioner of Critical Antiquarian booksellers will further our know Industries, Art Phillips served as alderman (1968- ledge on this fascinating business. 73), mayor (1973-6) and Liberal MP for Vancouver Ivan Sayers will present historic costumes from Center (1979-80). the sublime to the absurd, and Phil and Hilda March 27 Thomas will discuss the origins of British Colum “Vancouver Mayors 3: Bill Rathie” - Bill Rathie bia folk songs, and sing them for us. An accountant and tax consultant, Bill Rathie, Saturday afternoon you will have a choice of Vancouver’s first native-born mayor, served as several conducted tours. alderman (1959-62) and was elected mayor (1963- A detailed program will appear in the April 6) on the slogan “Let’s Get Vancouver Going”. issue of the News. April 27 To Be Announced May 28

A.G.M./”Vancouver Mayors 4: Louis 0. Taylor” - Mary Rawson Vancouver’s longest serving mayor (1910-11, 1915, 1925-26, 1941-44), L.D. Taylor arrived in the city in 1896 and worked for the Vancouver Daily Province. In 1905 he purchased the World. NEXT ISSUE During his reign, the Lions Gate Bridge was built The next issue of the B.C. Historical News will and the fire department completely mechanized. have a Vancouver Centennial theme. Please Each lecture starts at 8 p.m. in the Vancouver submit news and notes from various branches, by Museum Auditorium, 1100 Chestnut Street. February 15, to guest editor Esther Birney, 1240 Light refreshments will be served after each Shorepine Walk, Vancouver, V6H 3T8. meeting, and members of the audience will have an opportunity to meet the guest speaker. Visitors and new members welcome. For further information contact: Peggy Imredy 738-0953; Margaret Waddington 266-4709.

British Columbia Historical News Page 27 At this point our Society said there should be Burnaby Historical Society an advisory body qualified to evaluate the historical/architectural merit of buildings, and requested that l3urnaby Council establish a Municipal Heritage Advisory Committee. We know that there is a bmit to what may be saved, Windows To Burnaby’s Past but we must strive to keep the best of our heritage The Burnaby Historical resources. Immigrants of diverse Society was on the verge backgrounds have enhanced of disbanding in 1983 for lack our rich cultural of interest. What heritage that is preserved in influenced them to produce buildings, photo a three-volume graphs, documents and stories, all of heritage report in 1985 and which give lobby Burnaby a sense of pride, security and belonging. Council to establish a Municipal To Heritage ignore history and past achievements is Advisory Committee? It was due primarily to negate to an memory, and where there is loss of injection of enthusiasm and challenge memory by three there is loss of identity. Burnaby has ninety-three young people: Robert Powys of Delta, Ann Watson of North years of history and her heritage resources Vancouver, and Jim Wolf of should Surrey. Their efforts be recorded before neglect, deteriora resulted in a record of tion and demolition take buildings erected by early their toll. Unfortunate settlers during the first ly, the motion to establish 38 years of Burnaby’s 93 year a M.H.A.C. was history. defeated by Burnaby Council. It happened that a citizen of Delta, Robert Following the demolition of the Powys prop Powys, wanted to buy the old Powys home, built erty and the refusal of Council to form an active in 1900, located at 7356 - 11th Avenue, Burnaby. advisory committee, the Historical Society Robert’s family and his sea-captain grandfather created a Heritage Advisory Committee and had owned and occupied the home for about fifty-six applied to the B.C. Heritage Trust for a grant years. Robert’s father had recently died under the Student and Robert Employment Program, to thought it a fitting memorial to conduct an initial survey purchase the old and inventory of home, restore it at his own Burnaby’s pre-1930 buildings. expense, and live in it. He encountered prob The committee lems set three goals: in locating the owner and arranging a trade 1. To survey and list many of near-by property. of the best buildings The owner simply wanted and structures; to demolish the house and divide the 62’ by 145’ 2. To apply to the Trust for lot into two 31’ lots, a student grant to and sell them. In despera employ a student to do survey; tion, Powys appealed to the Historical Society to 3.To request that Council write to Burnaby re-consider our Council on his behalf, asking previous request for a that the house Municipal Heritage be saved. It was expected that Advisory Committee. Council would reject any plan to subdivide lots In mid-March, Pauline Rafferty, that would result in 31’ Program frontage, a figure below Manager for B.C. Heritage Trust Student Employ the normal minimum frontage standards. To divide ment, informed our Society that our project had a 62’ lot seemed a poor precedent to set. been In reply selected as one of 50 from about 300 to the Society’s letter in support of applications. The maximum Powys’ time allotted for the request, Council tabled the letter, project was from mid-May “pending further to Mid Aug., 62 information,” It was stated working days to cover 36.9 sq. mi. that, further and approxi “No action is proposed to be taken mately 780 streets. It was by staff in this regard a prodigious task; unless specific direction is however, Ann Watson, a student a Simon given by Council” Fraser (April, 1984). University tackled the job and overcame At the end of the such summer of 1984, Robert obstacles as barking dogs, the absence of Powys and the BHS learned that an on June 25, 1984, occupant in a house, or lack of knowledge a demolition permit had by been issued to the occupant of the age, architect or builder of the owner of the old Powys property, and soon dwelling, traffic and parking hazards, and dense afterward there was complete obliteration of the foliage that defied photo-taking. house, trees, shrubs and hedges. In the bare When a further grant under the Challenge ‘85 ground were stakes marking the two 31’ lots. Summer Employment Program of the Ministry of

Page 28 British Columbia Historical News (I to r) Jim Wolf, Alderman Don Brown, Evelyn Salisbury, John Adams, and Ann Watson

Labour was approved, Jim Wolt, 13H5 archivist, re-consider our previous request that they joined Ann’s survey project. When the final establish a Municipal Heritage Advisory Com report was completed it was titled Windows to mittee. The membership passed the motion and Burnaby’s Past. when it was dealt with in Council, the eight In recognition of Burnaby’s 93rd birthday in aldermen voted to accept in principle the September, the BHS conducted a special general establishment of a M.H.A.C. meeting in September, giving prominence to the At a final gala presentation, at the Robson birthday theme. “On September 22, 1892, Square Media Centre, before the B.C. Heritage Burnaby ceased to be an unorganized territory Trust Directors and the representative of the B.C. of 250 residents and by legislative charter and Yukon Division of the Board of Governors of became the Corporation of the District of Heritage Canada Foundation, the Hon. Henry Burnaby.” It was appropriate at this time to make Bell-Irving, the students and sponsors made their presentations of Windows To Burnaby’s Past as a reports. It was a tribute to the authors of the BHS Birthday Book to Burnaby, Burnaby Arts Council, report that additional time was given for their Burnaby Public Library, and Burnaby Village presentation. Museum. Evelyn Salisbury is chairman of the BHS At the close of the memorable meeting, Allan Heritage and Vice Corbett, BHS and Heritage committee member, Advisory Committee President of the read a motion requesting that Burnaby Council BHS.

British Columbia Historical News Page 29 •• •• • • 0 • 0 * •. •• . •. • • •

Jewish Historical Society Leonard Frank Display

When this giant of Canadian photographers passed away February 23, 1944, the Victoria Colonist, in a rare editorial, said eloquently what his contemporaries already knew; The death of Mr. Leonard Frank of Vancouver removes a figure widely known in British Columbia. For many years Mr. Frank special ized in industrial photography. His pictures of British Columbia logging, mining, fishing, and other scenes were celebrated, and they have appeared literally all over the world. The cut files of this journal and many another British Columbia newspaper bear eloquent testi mony to the art and industry of a man who was a patient, tireless craftsman, anda masterof his calling. Leonard Frank’s name is assured of becoming known all over again. Since his death much of his collection of negatives, photos and enlarge ments have been quietly preserved in the estate of his successor, Otto Landauer. But, now, good news! The Jewish Historical Society of B.C. has just acquired the entire residual collection, and goes on record in promising to make the priceless, historical photos available again. To start with, a Vancouver centennial Leonard Frank Display will be open to the public March Leonard 4th to 21st, 1986, in the Shalom Gallery of the Frank’s portrait was made by another famous Vancouver Jewish Community Centre, 950 West 41st Ave. British Columbia photographer, Jack Savannah. Mr. Frank served British Columbia and the world for fifty years, and his fine photographs number well over 20,000. This unique legacy will now be publicized and shown by the Jewish Historical Society.

Page 30 British Columbia Historical News Bookshelf

.:

HERITAGE: THE SCRAMBLE FOR CAPTURED Captured Heritage will be of fundamental interest ARTIFACTS. Douglas Cole. NORTHWEST COAST to the worldwide audience of museum curators, Douglas & Mcintyre, 1985. Pp. xv. 373, Vancouver: anthropologists, archaeologists and ethnohistorians illus., $24.95. with a special interest in the rich material heritage of Douglas Cole’s Captured Heritage deals mainly the Northwest Coast culture area. The book will with the collection and export from coastal British become a textbook for university courses in British Columbia of Indian artifacts to museums outside Columbia history and anthropology. One of the British Columbia. It begins with the visit of the many connections that Cole reveals, in his under Santiago in 1774, and takes us through the nineteenth stated way, is the one between museum collecting century, when Franz Boas, C.F. Newcombe and their and the evolution of the Boasian ethnographical agents collected on an extensive and often rapacious method. Boas, who first came to the coast as a scale for museums in the United States and, to a lesser collector in 1886, subsequently encouraged his field extent, for museums in Canada. The book is well- collectors to provide complete documentation for researched and written, and Cole’s anecdotal style is each artifact they acquired, and instructed them not well suited to the richness of the historical record. The to overlook objects of everyday use. As a museum strangest part of the book must be the story of the curator, Boas championed the display of artifacts not journey of fifteen Kwakiutl to the Chicago World’s by type but by ethnic group. This concern was Fair of 1893, where they were displayed, like zoologi thoroughness and with a group’s cultural integrity cal specimens, as part of an “open mart and caravan provided Boas with the inspiration for his later sary of nations” alongside Indonesians, Eskimos and ethnographic field work (Ch. 5). Irish villagers (pp. 127-128). The book’s greatest value is as a guide to the origin Why were most coastal Indians, sooner or later, and evolution of the great museum collections of willing to part with their most precious possessions? artifacts from the Northwest Coast. The book is First, Cole notes, the decline in the native population written for an international scholarly audience, and as in the nineteenth century “created a surplus of many such, it is a work of great importance. The effect, objects at precisely the period of most intense however, of Cole’s familiarity with outside museums collecting.” Second, “while population declined, and outside record groups is that British Columbia creating a surplus of ceremonial items, the introduc remains something of a frontier in the book. just as tion of European manufactured goods rendered early collectors saw the coast as a frontier, rich in many utilitarian objects obsolete and therefore available artifacts, so British Colu mbia comes across as disposable.” (p. 295) Against this background, Cole Boas perceived it—as a “remote place” where documents how rival collectors competed for a scholars would have no chance of viewing artifacts (p. diminishing number of artifacts in the most intensive 289). period of collecting between 1875 and 1914. That nineteenth century British Columbia was a From the point of view of what Cole terms a materialist, immigrant society where “racism was “nativist” (p. 91), it is sad how American collectors conspicuous and unabashed” (p. 228) is beyond simply absorbed the coast in a sort of “ethnological doubt. But there were a few British Columbians with a Monroe Doctrine”. (p. 74) Canadian collectors, like social conscience or with an interest, official or I.W. Powell and C.F. Newcombe, may have lamented unofficial, in Indian welfare. Cole makes no mention the dispersal of artifacts from Canada, but they of colonial British Columbia’s 1865 legislation entitled realized that, with an absence of interest in this “An Ordinance to Prevent Violation of Indian country, their exportation at least ensured their Graves”, which was extended to Vancouver Island preservation. It is lamentable that government with the union of the colonies, and which was not officials from Powell in the 1870s to Francis Kermode repealed upon union with Canada. Presumably it was in the 1930s were unable or unwilling to prevent the this ordinance that provided the basis of the objec export of important collections. One inevitable result tions to Boas and the Suttons’ grave-robbing exploits of the Monroe Doctrine-like, cultural imperialism at Cowichan in the 1880s (pp. 119-121). Who framed was the appearance, in 1980, of a Bella Coola this pioneering ordinance, why was it made into law, ceremonial mask on an American postage stamp! and when if ever was it repealed?

British Columbia Historical News Page3l

Page32 News Historical Columbia British

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this in $6.95 mentions Cole illus. 99, collectors. vi, Pp. visiting to 1984. Books, help Braemar Victoria:

much provide Underhill. initiative, Stuart individual a 985, of level on 1860-1 did, IRON CHURCH THE

they artifacts, collected have not may sense corporate

formal, a in officials Company While Columbia. collectors. British of the University

museum by at ransacked History in was coast candidate a the point doctoral which is Mackie Richard

at century, nineteenth late or mid- the frontier. this until turbed on Indians the among

undis relatively worked and remain to lived culture who their those of activities allowing collecting

in was Indians the coastal fully more Columbia’s British documents to that legacy needed is book

main Company’s Another the Columbia. Perhaps British of bureaucracy? history pany’s bureaucratic

Com the the of or rule benign intellectual the be) to but generally claim it patriarchal does (nor not

the of is a result it also it States, was United the and settlement; Ottawa, white of Victoria, in lateness tions

the of result a collec was museum to survival cultural guide and This book be? to come reference sable

this did How indispen (p. 294) an as serve Age.” will Museum the Heritage of advent Captured While

the at unshattered relatively remained which society. cultures

material the to striking reference and rich a of passing areas only makes Cole American Yet North

few the of Hesquiat. one of was Brabant Coast and Father Boas Northwest Franz “The that fact included

important lecturers Guest fundamentally Hastings. the told are Oregon we photographer book, the and of

(p.

end the Green, toward Yet 6) Ashdown surveyor reserve conscientious.” more Indian been Beanlands,

have to Canon “seem and Company Deans James collectors Russian-American the Newcombe, of

officials C.F. the that included and membership collecting”, Its little women. “did and men Company

the that professional remarks other Cole and assessed. officials government adequately not traders,

is Company fur Bay retired Hudson’s officers, the of naval role the clerics, of place interested Similarly, well as the previous rector’s illness had taken their volume for social historians, its utility is diminished by toll. Under the dynamic and community-minded a few but important organizational errors. Most leadership of Rev. Biddle, St. John’s congregation was importantly among these is Vibert’s alphabetical more than rebuilt before the church celebrated its arrangement of the data; while this is very convenient centenary in 1960. The unfortunate destruction of the for researchers who already possess the surname of a church building by fire at the end of that year did not research subject, it is a severe hindrance to historians daunt the parishioners or the pastor. The rebuilding wishing to use the work for regional studies. For a process showed their ability to renew themselves social historian who wished to study say, occupational once more. structure in the Cariboo, one would literally have to It is good to see that the 125th anniversary of St. scan all 15,000 entries to pick out the relevant John’s and another aspect of Victoria history have individuals. Obviously, alphabetical listings are been recorded with this volume. It should inspire convenient to geneologists, but such an arrangement further archival collecting, research and interpreta limits the scope of the volume’s audience. tion on St. John’s, its staff, and its congregation—part Vibert’s work includes three pages of helpful and of the neglected British aspect of British Columbia generally useful maps of the province, including history. The photographs of the original and renov detailed insets of the more important regions. This ated churches might be studied as documents on the particular feature could, however, have been ren architectural and social history of the community. The dered even more valuable had the author included a ministers and their congregations might be examined brief index indicating which map to consult when too. Their origins and experience lay in Scotland and locating a given city or town. Canada as well as in England. Did many church Final criticisms of this work are of a very minor members share Reverend Biddle’s British birth and nature. Vibert does not clarify why a separate list of Canadian prairie experience and education? What of Chinese household heads, partially derived from the the ladies in the guilds? Who taught in the Sunday “Voter’s List,” is included in this work when the Schook and what and why? How did St. John’s volume’s Preface implies their exclusion from contribute to the shaping of Victoria as a little bit of political activity. Vibert also fails to point out the old England and as part of the Anglican Church in absence of virtually all native peoples from inclusion Canada? in either the Directory or “List” data; with population Jacqueline Gresko, an active member of the Vancou estimates as high as 40,000 for the year 1871, the native ver Historical Society, teaches History at Douglas presence should at least be mentioned if only to place College. non-native figures in their proper perspective. Finally, it should be mentioned that census data, HEADS OF HOUSEHOLD IN BRITISH COLUMBIA in albeit inadequate in some instances, is available for 1874. ed. Pat Vibert. Vancouver: British Columbia selected areas of the province prior to the federal Geneaological Society, 1984. Pp. vii, 117, maps, no 1881 census. For example, the census conducted in price given. (Obtainable through the B.C. Genealogi Victoria in 1871 was used as a partial basis for H.L. cal Society, P.O. Box 94371, Richmond, B.C. V6X 1W9) Langevin’s findings in his Report on British Columbia of the following year. At the moment work is being In recent years the historiography of British undertaken by an independent researcher to com Columbia has been enriched in sum and in kind by a pile a comprehensive list of early census data for the growing body of scholars committed to the use of province—a point which some historians and gen census data and other such routinely generated eologists may wish to keep in mind. material. The use of this type of primary documenta Despite the aforementioned drawbacks, tion Vibert’s has increased among both amateur and profes work is important in that it gives researchers sional researchers. Pat easy Vibert’s work is noteworthy as access to two historical resources and stimulates an addition to reference documents on nineteenth interest in the era as well as the use of these forms of century British Columbia. historical documentation. Heads of Household in British Columbia in 1874 combines information from two important historical Irene Moorhouse has worked with census data and is sources: The Victoria Directory (1875), and “A List of currently completing an MA. thesis on Social History Persons Entitled to Vote” contained in the Journals of in Colonial Victoria at the University of Victoria. the Legislative Assembly of British Columbia (1875) Vibert has compiled over 15,000 entries containing ROLLING WITH THE TIMES, Wallace Baikie. Camp information such as the name, occupation, location bell River: Campbell River Museum and Archives, and electoral particulars for individual, primarily 1984. illus. $20.00 male, heads of households in B.C. This is an engrossing collection of stories which While this work is a laudable attempt to integrate focus on pioneer life and logging exploits on the two existing historical sources into a single reference North Island. Baikie wrote the book to record some

British Columbia Historical News Page33

Page 34 News Historical Columbia British

subsidiary? agricultural Company’s Bay Hudson’s the was What of the name

is: qucstion The 1986. 1, March before the News of Editor the to question, the to answer send following your

it, win To Canada. Western in agriculture of history the in interest an to with anyone appeal This book will

Valley. Kettle the of in Ranch, Toad and Hall

B.X. the on buildings of Victoria, near barn hop early an of photo a is but barns on there the are Prairies,

the Most of white. and black in sketches and photographs historical and with extant barns, of photographs

with colour illustrated generously book is The $26.95). Victoria, Bob Hainstock by Books, (Braemar

Century, Illustrated An Canada: Western of Barns book, handsome very a new For have contest we our

ideas. useful

of a number contained letter Goddard’s Ms. the News. improving for suggestion a constructive was contest

the for Entry Breuer. Michael and Dodd Kerry by 1984) Press, University Carr, of (Oxford Emily Landscape

The Shadows, and prize: The Sunlight Duncan. of Goddard Evelyn contest is The our of winner current

eontebt

and So brothers accurate company. their formed own

a two as his “gypo” and panies and he when logger

com Baikie jobs large with he the describes held

a oxen, recent to steam methods, donkey, more

Island and its horses, From with logging surroundings.

V8V2j1 Victoria St.,

Clarence

a experiences as on Vancouver Northern logger

602-139 at her to sent be

should

review for books

personal his of account an largely is book life, the

of Copies Editor.

Review Book the is Roy Patricia there Although Baikie’s anecdotes are several from

(pp. then cutting throat. his 10-11)

the and hitting hammer an pig eight with pound

up so for being he the ended tough on pig. think I

the out house. into Dad out Mum bawling came

the leg. scurrying us and My hind Dad sent mad got

a is resident. Campbell Lorna Holyer River

by at abode my to the Dad out his pig trying of pull

$20.00. of get on laughing the to got We execution. with kids

cost a at River and Museum the bookstores Campbell could slept) Dad and my come out that so wouldn’t

local With Rolling from available Times is The and pig off the a got shed little into (where low

century. bullet did wandered not Pig spot. the Mr. vital hit

the of the pioneering of turn from and life logging the aim and was head moved the off his or pig

as as documentation well style readable its historical the Dad’s my knife. butcher this Well, on occasion,

its for a appeal The to Times readership will broader with throat his and twenty-two, him slice over roll

With Rolling its and this makers, claim reader that can a with to eyes the is process the shoot between pig

history area’s unfamiliar newcomer, the of much with the at job do To job. proficient right, the the

a As a history by written figure. local prominent got (sic) concerned. ever I Dad my don’t thing

local a as appeal have reviews emphasized book’s the were a a Killing we as kids was as big pig event, far

Other sources, albums. personal Baikie’s including following:

various from gleaned memorable photographs, the as to seems read, hear, such accounts rather than

of pages by are stories The 1980s. accompanied to One life. anecdotes an read The history. like oral

the to up With Rolling The Times events covers Baikie’s recollections unique style writing brings his

blond. up and a Congress with met mysterious as experiences a child.

Logging a a involves Pacific that cougar attended the recount own hardships Baikie’s of and life pioneer

to mind A the comes tale job. off that particularly the in family, late stories first The century. nineteenth

and on and some hijinks the competitions of loggers’ father, mother’s and the Piercey Wallace’s clan,

log rolling about also tales There great some are arrival on Denman Wallace’s William Island Baikie, of

the book! the personal Baikie’s with beginning experience

and the after finishing woods into timber, his own log a dates bury around good tales story. revolve The

go to the enough he might that reader knows decide and the reader, for names never many lets he too

techniques his of logging are detailed descriptions that local Fortunately be history lost. might otherwise 3E8 V8R 1R9 V7R Victoria 3R9 5E9 1NO 3P3 St., V6J V9S 1ZO VOR iWO

FEDERATION 1Y2 2A6 4H7 V9W Taylor Vancouver Bay VOH VOX V6L V6R V8V 1X4 River 1745 Nanaimo North Vancouver Rogers, V9S C. St., Akrigg. Rd., Victoria Ave., News, Princeton Cowichan 2K0 Vancouver Vancouver Summerland Campbell Columbia 687, Helen VOB Maple Robert Road, St., Crown Nanaimo 29th, Rd., Stewart Ave., to Box

HISTORICAL Historical W. St., British Wasa Wellington, publication. 8th Butler #2-1430 of P.O. Mount Wessex B.C. 2875 W. for 116 105, #1, #211-450 Pinecrest Honourable Juniper 1241 1875 4633 Box manuscripts 680 R.R. Editor, the 262 McCann McCann, available Stoneberg, Andrews, (res.) (res.) (res.) (res.) (bus.) (res.) (res.) (res.) (res.) (res.) C. Orr, G. Spittle Spittle, Stannard, Richardson, Miller Haslam, Sale, Miller, submit Akrigg, Elliott, are G. Barnett, D. D. G.S. Honour,

COLUMBIA Don Rhys Loans Helen Please Naomi Ruth Leonard 228-8606 Myrtle Barbara 287-8097 Marie Naomi Mary John Leonard Margaret 754-6195 I. Col. John His T. 295-3362 748-8397 Lieutenant-Governor 422-3594 753-2067 733-1897 (res.) 382-7202 736-4431 988-4565

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Committees: News

of Assistance (not Secretary:

BRITISH President: Patron: Historical President: President: Trails: Committee: Committee: B.C. Historical Vice Vice

THE involved Publications Policy Lieutenant-Governor’s Committee Historic Award News): Chairmen with President: Recording Past-President: B.C. Members-at-Large: Seminars: Officers Honorary 2nd Honorary 1st Secretary: Treasurer: s

/

J •/ The British Columbia Historical News invites applications for the position of Editor.

This voluntary position begins in May 1986 with preparation for the Volume 19, Number 4 issue. Send applications to:

J. Rhys Richardson Chairperson’ B C Historical News Policy Committee Box 35326, Station B Vancouver, B.C. V6M 4G5

Deadline for applications is April 1, 1986.